The finance ministry is staring at a shortfall of Rs 50,000 crore in disinvestment target for the current fiscal and is hoping to make up for it through higher revenue realisation, sources said.
The finance ministry is staring at a shortfall of Rs 50,000 crore in disinvestment target for the current fiscal and is hoping to make up for it through higher revenue realisation, sources said.
The government has so far raised only Rs 12,700 crore through PSU disinvestments in the current fiscal and may raise another Rs 6,000-Rs 7,000 crore in the remaining three months.
“There would be at least Rs 50,000 crore shortfall with regard to disinvestment target. The government would meet the shortfall through taxable, non-taxable revenue mop-up,” an official source said.
The government had budgeted to raise Rs 69,500 crore via disinvestment of PSUs in current fiscal. Of this, Rs 41,000 crore was to come from minority stake sale in PSUs and another Rs 28,500 crore from strategic stake sale. However, with volatile stock markets, the government has been able to mop up Rs 12,700 crore through stake sale in four PSUs — Indian Oil, REC, PFC and Dredging Corp.
The government is likely to step up efforts to mop up additional resources by hiking duties and seeking higher dividends from PSUs to make up for the shortfall in disinvestment and direct tax proceeds in its bid to meet the fiscal deficit target. The government on December 16 increased the excise duty on petrol by Rs 0.30 per litre and by Rs 1.17 a litre on diesel to make use of slump in oil pri-ces to garner additional Rs 2,500 crore.
